


I used to live alone before I knew you

by twoohugs



Series: Advent Calendar 2019 [7]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Christmas, First Meetings, M/M, Ugly Sweaters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-14
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:15:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21743614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twoohugs/pseuds/twoohugs
Summary: “I played the clarinet in school.” He said. Ella nodded, looking at him expectantly. There was a rather lengthy silence. “And I can knit, I guess.”In which Ella the therapist actually gave John useful advice, and he has something better to do than walk around in the park. He doesn’t need to meet Mike Stamford, anywayーMrs. Hudson is a just-as-good, if not better, matchmaker.
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Series: Advent Calendar 2019 [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1556131
Comments: 16
Kudos: 153





	1. John

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I have very, very limited understanding of PTSD, and have no idea how therapy for it works. In this fic, Ella’s advice mainly focuses on helping John find a purpose in life after leaving the army. If anything is misleading or wrong, please feel free to let me know.
> 
> Title from Hallelujah.

John steps out of his temporary shop to make sure the sign outside (“Hand-knitted Holiday Sweaters Pop-up - 1-25 December”) is positioned properly. It is cold outside, especially since he just came out of the warm shop without his coat. Shivering, John walks back indoors and flips over the sign on the door that says “OPEN”.

He looks over the display laid over the counter in the center of his temporary shop and smiles. Even if he ends up selling none of them, he would still be damn proud of himself for finishing all these sweaters AND actually opening the pop-up store to sell them. 

After his return from Afghanistan, accompanied by a tremor in his hand and a limp, John found himself at a loss of purpose, and in things to do in general. Ella, his therapist, suggested blogging, but when he posted “Nothing happened today, again. Here, Ella, I’m blogging. See?” everyday for a consecutive week, she switched strategies and asked him if he had any hobbies.

“I played the clarinet in school.” He said. Ella nodded, looking at him expectantly. There was a rather lengthy silence. “And I can knit, I guess.”

Ella recommended knitting, saying that producing a tangible output would give him a greater sense of accomplishment. John was rather dubious about that, doubtful of his shaking hands’ ability to handle a craft like knitting, but he was pleasantly surprised when he realizes not only does hand tremor not affect knitting as much as he feared, but the shaking actually eases when he is occupied. 

Before he started his first sweater, he looked online to see that it usually takes people a couple of months to knit a sweater. However, he forgot to account for the fact that normal people ( _other_ people, Ella would correct him,) have actual jobs and can only spend an hour or two knitting, while he basically has nothing to do other than reading and watching the telly. He ended up finishing the first sweater within two weeks. Once he has gotten the hang of it, he became even faster, and the next sweater was finished within a week.

Ella was _overjoyed_ when John told her about the abundance of knitted wear in his apartment.

"Would you like to sell them? Put up a pop-up store or something." She suggests, tapping her pen on her chin, "You can lose some of these sweaters you don't need, earn some extra income－you've said the pension wouldn't last too long－and preparing for it would give you something to do."

So here he is, a few months later, in a shop front he has rented for the duration of 24 days, displaying a whole variety of hand-knitted festive sweaters for sale. John doesn’t really know what to expect regarding the sales and revenue. Baker Street isn’t exactly deserted, but it isn’t a particularly busy street either. There’s a small cafe across the street right opposite John’s shop, though, with a steady flow of customers. The people leaving the shop with their caffeine fix don’t seem to notice anything around them except the cup in their hands, but maybe the more leisure patrons that visit later would have some interest in the colourful sweaters on display. 

John’s first visitor is, however, not a customer from the cafe, but one of its employees. The young woman walks in, still in her apron, bringing with her the aroma of coffee.

“Hello.” She says. “I work in the cafe across the street. I’m Anne. Welcome to Baker Street.”

“Hello, Anne.” John says. Despite what Ella says about him being a recluse (not her exact wording, but John can read between the lines), he is good at small-talk and basic social interactions.

“I brought this for you.” Anne says, taking out a small paper bag from the pocket of her apron. “A welcome gift. And to thank you for bringing in the festive mood.”

“Oh, that’s very generous. Thank you.” John sighs happily when he opens the bag to see a piece of brownie, “This looks so great! I really should come over to visit later.”

“That would be great. We usually aren’t very busy after the morning rush.” Anne says distractedly as she scans through the sweaters. “These are so beautiful. Maybe we all should get one and wear them as uniforms. I'll come back later to browse properly after I cleaned my hands.”

"You'll be most welcome." John says, smiling, as Anne leaves the shop as breezily as she did entering it.

Anne came back that afternoon, just before John closes up, with another worker from the cafe. They left with the some of the most outrageously festive jumpers he has to offer. Then, they invited John to their cafe for dinner.

"We serve pasta at night." Anne said as she half-dragged John across the road.

Later, when John is sipping on a cup of tea, his stomach satisfyingly full, the employees at the cafe slip on the jumpers and did an impromptu catwalk in the shop.

"They're a bit too pricey for us to buy one for each employee, so people working different shifts may have to share." Anne said thoughtfully as she smoothes her hand over the soft wool. "But they're honestly worth the price. I've never felt a sweater this soft!"

John silently preens. He spent so much time touching every kind of wool available at the shop to find the softest, most comfortable material for his projects.

"You all will become walking advertisements for me." He chuckles.

"Oh, we'll tell everyone where we got them!" Anne says, her eyes twinkling.

True to her words, beginning the next day, Anne sends people after people to his shop. Many would walk in, touch the sweaters, look at the price tag, sigh and leave (John would smile apologetically to them but he already set the prices as low as he could without losing money), but some would stay to talk, or even buy something.

On one memorable occasion a few days later, an older lady walked in, and spent half an hour chatting with him about knitting before even looking at the sweaters. Then, she attempts to use John as a model to find a sweater that fits someone she's gifting to, onto to shake her head in disappointment a moment later.

"It's not your problem, my dear." She said hurriedly at a slightly hurt but mostly amused John, "He's just so abnormally tall and lanky! Poor boy never eats enough."

After a scan of the shopfront, the old lady, Mrs Hudson, decides that one of the standing coat hangers has a close resemblance to the body shape of "Sherlock", the tall lanky "boy" in question, and the two use it as a benchmark to find the best sweater for him.

"I hope he likes it." John says cheerily as he folds up the final choice of Mrs. Hudson, a green sweater with a slightly distorted santa at the front.

 _This is a nice idea,_ John writes on his blog that night, _but don't you dare gloat, Ella._


	2. Sherlock

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You will notice chunks of dialogue taken from S1E01 of Sherlock. All rights to BBC, and I don't own any of the characters or the original lines.

Sherlock isn't sure what to do with the hideous piece of clothing in his hands. Its colour, the shape (or lack thereof), the pattern… everything about the sweater was absolutely disgusting, except for its texture.

Sherlock doesn't often regret his own actions, but this time he admits he should have looked up when Mrs. Hudson came up and gave him the sweater.

"It's made of the best quality yarn, Sherlock, not the stiff, hard stuff you get in department stores. This'll keep you warm so much better than your shirts." She fussed as Sherlock marked down another note, not looking up from his telescope, "Your coat alone isn't going to be enough this winter, Sherlock, you need better insulation! Make sure you wear this when you go out." Sherlock just gave her a noncommittal hum and waved her away. He put the incident in the back of his mind and continued on his experiment. 

Now, a few days later, he is staring at the atrocious piece of clothing lying on the back of his sofa and scowling. Mrs. Hudson is right for onceーhis usual ensemble is not warm enough, but he has to go out. Lestrade just texted about a case, one that’s barely worth his attention, but considering he’ll be leaving to spend the Christmas with his parents tomorrow and is going to get stuck with Mycroft for a whole week, he’s going to need all the fresh air he can get. That means he needs warm clothing. Just because he considers his body a mere vessel doesn’t mean he’d allow himself to fall ill under something as mundane as pneumonia.

Making up his mind, Sherlock picks up the sweater and gingerly pulls it over his head. If he keeps his eyes shut, he can imagine he is not completely humiliating himself with this abomination. The material is indeed soft. Not cashmere, but still very good quality wool. Whose idea it is to dye good-quality wool this colour? Even the sheep should feel insulted. 

Sherlock huffs, makes sure his long coat is covering every inch of the disgusting green wool, and leaves his apartment. He instinctively further curls into himself as the first gust of wind sends a chill down his whole body. 

Bitter as he is, Sherlock has to admit the sweater provides a nice added layer of warmth. And if he is completely honest with himself, there is a certain thrill in knowing he is hiding something so scandalous right there underneath his coat, yet everyone else is none the wiser. Even Mycoft wouldn’t be able to see through the outer layer to know he’s benefiting from the comfort of a sweater of such hideousness.

Sherlock steps into Speedy’s for a cup of coffee before he departs for the latest crime scene, only to stop dead in his tracks when he sees what the employees are wearing.

“Sweet black, right?” The girl behind the counter asks cheerfully. Sherlock ignores her and continues to stare at the sweater she’s wearing. It is a bright red in colour, with giant snowflake patterns, which is as different from Sherlock’s own as it can get. However, the degree of ugly of that thing, and the style of the obviously amateur knitting (amongst other clues) clearly show that these two pieces of monstrosity are of the same origin.

“Where did you get those?” Sherlock asks, unable to repress the incredulity in his tone. 

He is fully aware that since Mrs. Hudson didn’t knit the sweater herself, she must have bought it somewhere (he would certainly know if she knitted it herself, duh). But it is an entirely different thing to come face to face with the evidence that there are actual human beings in this world that would make and sell these things, and ones that are deranged enough to _pay_ for them. Sherlock would like to think people are at least a slight bit wiser with their money than this.

Oblivious to Sherlock’s apparent dismay, the girl happily points him towards to shop right opposite the road. 

“John knitted all of it by himself, and he’s really nice! You should go and see sometimes.” She chatters on as Sherlock turns and leaves the cafe with a swish of his coat, coffee forgotten.

Last time Sherlock checked, the shop opposite Speedy’s was empty. There was a temporary store that made ice-cream rolls in the summer, which attracted crowds of teenagers and made noises that irritated Sherlock to no end. Now, however, there are no crowds in front of the store. There is a large sign that says “Hand-knitted Holiday Sweaters Pop-up - 1-25 December”, and two huge sweaters (each as ugly as the next) hanging behind the display windows, but the store was inconspicuous otherwise.

Sherlock isn’t exactly sure what drives him to go into the store. Afterall, he isn’t known to deliberately subject himself to unfavorable situations unless there is a purpose for it. (Donovan would say he’s a freak for enjoying gruesome crime scene yet cringes from ugly sweaters, but given the woman’s taste in men, she hardly has any right to comment on other people’s preferences.) To confront the creator of these clothes? To ridicule his lack of taste? To blame him for putting Sherlock in a position where he has to don such a piece of junk?

However, once he enters to shop, Sherlock barely spares a second scanning the storefront before his vision zooms into the man walking forward from behind the counter. He makes a quick assessment, and promptly forgets whatever purpose he had before, because this man in front of him, this small, damaged man is the most interesting he has seen in a long, long time. 

“Afghanistan or Iraq?” He blurts out.

“Sorry?” The man tilts his head.

“Which was it, in Afghanistan or Iraq?” Sherlock repeats.

“Um, Afghanistan.” The man answers despite his bewilderment. Sherlock nods and manages to turn his attention to the knitwear covering the counters and hangers in the temporary store front. “I don’t suppose you suffer from some sort of colour vision deficiency in addition to your psychosomatic limp?”

“What? No!” The man says indignantly, then frowns. “Wait. How did you know about Afghanistan? And the limp?”

“Your haircut and the way you hold yourself says military.” Sherlock begins. “Your face is tanned but no tan above the wrists. You've been abroad, but not sunbathing. Your limp's bad when you walk, but you don't need a chair when you stand, like you've forgotten about it, so it's at least partly psychosomatic. That says the original circumstances of the injury were traumatic. Wounded in action, then. Wounded in action, suntan - Afghanistan or Iraq.”

He takes a breath and looks up to see the veteran staring at him with… not the disgust he anticipated. There's obviously surprise. Confusion. Interest…?

“How?” The man asks simply, almost leaning forward eagerly.

“Simple deduction.” Sherlock says, feeling oddly wrong-footed at the man’s positive reaction. “I’m a consulting detective.”

“Consulting detective, huh?” The man looks at Sherlock contemplatively. “What else can you tell about me?”

Sherlock’s answer comes out of him before he could process it. 

“You’re short on money. You've got a brother that worried about you, but you won't go to him for help because you don't approve of him, possibly because he's an alcoholic, more likely because he recently walked out on his wife.” He says.

The man raises an eyebrow. “And how did you know all that?”

“The prices of your sweaters say you are trying to earn some profit through the shop, not just looking to dispose of the products of your hobby. Pension not enough, maybe? But your phone,” Sherlock nods at the device lying on the counter, “it's expensive, e-mail enabled, MP3 player. You wouldn't buy this - it's a gift. Scratches. Not one, many over time - it's been in the same pocket as keys and coins. You wouldn't treat your one luxury item like this, so it's had a previous owner.”

The man nods, picking up the phone. Taking that as an encouragement, Sherlock continues, 

“The engraving? Harry Watson.” He squints to make sure he is correct. “Clearly a family member who's given you his old phone. Not your father, this is a young man's gadget. Could be a cousin, but you're a war hero who’s short on money. Unlikely you've got an extended family, not one you're close to. So brother it is. Now, who's Clara? Three kisses says it's a romantic attachment. The expense of the phone says wife, not girlfriend. Must have given it to him recently, the model's only six months old. Marriage in trouble, then - six months on he's given it away. If she'd left him, he would have kept it. Sentiment. No, he wanted rid of it. He left her. He gave the phone to you, so he wants you to stay in touch. You need money, but not going to your brother for help. That says you've got problems with him. Maybe you liked his wife or don't like his drinking.”

The man, Watson, nods. “How can you possibly know about the drinking?” He challenges.

“Shot in the dark.” Sherlock grins. He is totally enjoying this. “Good one, though. Power connection - tiny little scuff marks round the edge. Every night he plugs it in to charge, but his hands are shaking. You never see those marks on a sober man's phone, never see a drunk's without them. There you go.”

Watson is full-on grinning now. “That was amazing.”

Sherlock feels his breath stutter in his chest for a beat. “You think so?”

“Of course it was.” Watson says. “It was extraordinary, quite extraordinary.”

Sherlock suppresses a smile of his own. “That's not what people normally say.”

“What do people normally say?”

“‘Piss off!’” Sherlock answers, and Watson lets out a loud crackle.

“Did I get anything wrong?” Sherlock asks. He felt oddly in need for Watson’s validation. Even though he is a man with highly questionable judgement who made the appalling pieces of knitwear. Must be because he’s the first person to actually enjoy listening to him in a long time.

“Harry and me don't get on, never have.” Watson says quietly. “Clara and Harry split up three months ago and they're getting a divorce. And Harry is a drinker.”

Sherlock raises a satisfied eyebrow. “Spot on, then. I didn't expect to be right about everything.”

Then, he notices a smug glint in Watson’s eyes. “Harry's short for Harriet.” He says, his grin widening.

Sherlock throws back his head and groans. “Harry's your sister. Sister! There's always something.” 

Watson is practically shaking in silent laughter. “There, there.” He snickers. Sherlock only grumbles unhappily.

“I’m John.” Watson says after a moment, holding out his hand.

“Sherlock Holmes.” Sherlock takes off the glove from his right hand, stuffs it in his pocket, and shakes Watson’s, John’s, hand.

John’s hands suddenly jerks in his. “Is that…” He says, looking at somewhere around Sherlock’s chest. Sherlock looks down and is horrified to discover that he has pulled open his coat when he stuffed the glove into the pocket, and the hideous green sweater is now showing.

John blinks, and smacks a hand over his forehead. “You’re Mrs. Hudson’s Sherlock!” He says.

Sherlock frowns. “Yes?”

“She talked so much about you the day she came to find a sweater for you.” John explains. “Now, given your comment about my colour vision, I take it you’re not here as a repeat customer?”

Sherlock flicks his coat closed with a grimace. “No! I just...” What _is_ he doing in here, anyway? “I live across the road.” He finishes lamely.

“Oh, you’re Mrs. Hudson’s neighbour?”

“No, she’s my landlady.” Sherlock paused. Hold on... “How do you feel about the violin?”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“I play the violin when I'm thinking and sometimes I don't talk for days on end. Would that bother you?”

“What? Why would that bother me?” John looks half amused and half confused. 

“Potential flatmates should know the worst about each other.” Sherlock explains, raising an eyebrow at John. “If your funds are running low, I expect you will be looking for a flat share?”

“Yes, but what…”

“Mrs. Hudson offers me a special deal because she owes me a favour, but it wouldn’t be appropriate to continue to take advantage of her that way.” Sherlock says.

“Oh, what kind of favour?”

“A few years back, her husband got himself sentenced to death in Florida. I was able to help out.”

“Sorry, you stopped her husband being executed?”

“Oh, no, I ensured it.”

John just blinks at him. Sherlock waits for as long as his patience allows.

“Your sign says you close at 5 o’clock. If you want to see the flat for yourself, I’ll meet you in front of 221B at a quarter past.” He nods at John, and turns to leave.

As he pulls open the door to the shop, he hears John say behind him, “Five fifteen. Yeah, sure. Why not.”

Not bothering to hide his pleased smile, Sherlock turns and nods goodbye to John again, noticing his expression of “what the hell just happened” (an expression worn by most people that interacts with Sherlock), and left the shop.

* * *

Lestrade doesn’t manage to get an answer of why Sherlock is in a good mood that day, but he, along with Sally, Philip, and all other officers, decide to devote their Christmas wishes to pray that whatever happened keeps happening, so their consulting detective would remain that way. 

And less than a month later, when the amiable Dr. John Watson accompanies Sherlock to Brixton, everyone present has a collective moment of Eureka, and start tripping over their own feet to tend to his every need because _we owe you everything, really, thank you, doctor. Thank you so much._

(John is rather confused, but he is used to Sherlock’s antics by now, and he realizes he should have known that the people who work with Sherlock would probably have quirks of their own.)


End file.
